TIME

Human health is in the hands of bacteria

N THE BEGINNING, THERE WERE SINGLE-CELL BACTERIA. They were the only life on earth for billions of years, then larger cells evolved, then multicellular organisms, and then plants and animals. But the bacteria never went away, and all organisms, including us humans, have had to learn to live with them. Today, the lessons they are teaching us could change the trajectory

You’re reading a preview, subscribe to read more.

More from TIME

TIME6 min read
Titans
Last May, U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy issued an advisory about the profound consequences of loneliness and isolation—a departure from the type of standard medical conditions his predecessors prioritized. While traveling the country, Murthy had
TIME1 min read
Protests Spread
Members of a student protest movement in support of Palestinian civilians link arms on Columbia University’s Manhattan campus on April 18. When the protesters, who called on Columbia to divest from companies that supply weapons to Israel, refused to
TIME2 min read
A Man In Full, Adapted And Redacted
Tom Wolfe’s A Man in Full is a massive book, in more ways than one. The 742-page social novel about a swaggering Atlanta real estate mogul, which took Wolfe over a decade to write, sold a jaw-dropping 1.4 million hardcover copies after its publicatio

Related Books & Audiobooks